Facing murder charges in 1991 Balwant Singh Multani disappearance and murder case, Punjab’s former Director General of Police (DGP) Sumedh Singh Saini finally joined the investigations by appearing before the Special Investigation Team (SIT) in Mohali’s Matour police station on Monday.

Punjab Police’s SIT, in connection with the disappearance case of junior engineer Balwant Singh Multani in 1991, had on Sunday issued summon to Saini to join the investigation. Saini reached the police station at around 11 am, and faced nearly 300 questions during the five-hour-long questioning.

Earlier on September 23, Punjab’s former top cop had failed to appear before the SIT on September 23, to evade arrest in the matter.

Now as the Supreme Court had granted him interim protection from arrest in the matter, he has joined the probe.

Saini was charged in May in connection with the disappearance of Balwant Singh Multani in 1991 when he was working as a junior engineer with the Chandigarh Industrial and Tourism Corporation (CITCO).

The police had last month added a murder charge under section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) in the disappearance case after two former Chandigarh police personnel — former UT Police Inspector Jagir Singh and former ASI Kuldeep Singh, who are also the co-accused — turned approver.

Saini, a 1982-batch IPS officer, was the youngest DGP in the country when he was appointed the state police chief in 2012. He was removed from the post in 2015 after protests following sacrilege incidents. He retired in 2018.